"I genuinely believe that Islamophobia is seen as more acceptable, more ‘committable’ than other forms of racism in today’s culture. I think that people who would baulk at the repeated use of racist language like the N-word and would publicly content that it is horrible or that they don’t like it, don’t regard Islamophobia in the same way."

SRtRC were grateful for the opportunity to catch up with Ava and ask her in the first part of the interview about online racism.

Former professional footballer Stan Collymore received yet more racist abuse on Twitter recently. What is your view about racism on social media, the lack of accountability and the difficulties with police involvement?

You have suffered racism and abuse on Twitter yourself. Can you tell us a little bit about that and the impact that it had on you?

"I spoke about it at the Women of the World Festivalin Southbank where we discussed digital bullying. I think that some people use these platforms to say things that they wouldn’t dare say to someone’s face. I am a little bit torn because in some sick way it is kind of a good thing because at least you get to show that some of these attitudes are still out there. Sometimes when you try to speak about racism people say ‘you’re imagining it’ or ‘it doesn’t happen anymore’ or ‘it has got a lot better’, but by doing things like retweeting the abuse that someone like Stan Collymore suffered, you can highlight that this stuff still happens in England in 2014."

You have also received abuse online for standing up against Islamophobia – what happened there?

"I think that it is ‘open season’ on Muslims in this current climate that we have because the press and the media present us with negative depictions of Muslim people everyday, which makes people think that it is ok because Muslims are seen as ‘scary’ or ‘threatening our way of life’. I think it says a lot about people that most Muslims who are abused or attacked are women; people don’t dare attack the guys, they don’t dare attack someone who is likely to fight back. All of the things that they are saying that hate Islam for; one of the most common being their apparent mistreatment of women does not manifest itself – they clearly aren’t bothered about ‘the mistreatment of women under Islam’ because they are attacking these same women."